Years ago (1989), I went to buy my first real entry into an audiophile class system.
The dealer introduced me to the Martin Logan line and in particular to the CLS speaker and then the Sequel ll.
Listening to the CLS was such an experience that I still vividly remember it 20 years later. I had never heard anything so transparent and detailed. I can stil feel what it was like, listening to that speaker..
My only problem was that I wanted a speaker that I could also hear in the background (if I was another room and not sitting in front of them). Unfortunately, that was a requirement that the CLS couldn't meet, if you were standing up (even in the same room as the speakers).. So, I reluctantly, bought the Sequel ll's.
I also bought a Bryston 4b and other equipment that fit my paltry, $12k budget at the time.
When we finished our transaction, the dealer brought me into a room to listen to their "reference" system, which was all Goldmund components played through their Apologue speaker. (A speaker that looked like it was made by the designers of Robo Cop.)
He put on a used album by Bonnie Raitt that he said he bought for $2.00, on Goldmund's reference turn table.
The sound was so real, that had Stevie Wonder been in the room, he would have sworn that Bonnie Raitt was singing live, right then and there, with her band laid out behind her....
It was amazing and the sound made my new system seem like a toy for kids. And that would go for the CLS's I had just listend to (albeit with the Bryston amp and lesser playback components).
I realize that Goldmund created the Apologue, with the intention of only building 300 of them, but still, I don't seem to have ever read a review on them or any Goldmund speaker nor their full systems.
It seems that many people know of Goldmund and there is a certain mystic about them, but they are rarely mentioned.
Goldmund Apologue Speaker
I once owned a pair of Super Dialogues. They cost around $10,000 back then (1989). They were excellent speakers, unraveling iformation and sounding beautiful (in a Goldmund way, which means, no harshness, much detail). I think that perhaps they lacked deep bass, but I didn't have the types of recording that conained much deep bass. Lovely speakers!